Reading 1 1 Sm 26:2, 7-9, 12-13, 22-23
In those days, Saul went down to the desert of Ziph
with three thousand picked men of Israel,
to search for David in the desert of Ziph.
So David and Abishai went among Saul’s soldiers by night
and found Saul lying asleep within the barricade,
with his spear thrust into the ground at his head
and Abner and his men sleeping around him.Abishai whispered to David:
“God has delivered your enemy into your grasp this day.
Let me nail him to the ground with one thrust of the spear;
I will not need a second thrust!”
But David said to Abishai, “Do not harm him,
for who can lay hands on the LORD’s anointed and remain unpunished?”
So David took the spear and the water jug from their place at Saul’s head, and they got away without anyone’s seeing or knowing or awakening.
All remained asleep, because the LORD had put them into a deep slumber.Going across to an opposite slope,
David stood on a remote hilltop
at a great distance from Abner, son of Ner, and the troops.
He said: “Here is the king’s spear.
Let an attendant come over to get it.
The LORD will reward each man for his justice and faithfulness.
Today, though the LORD delivered you into my grasp,
I would not harm the LORD’s anointed.”
Reading 2 1 Cor 15:45-49
Brothers and sisters:
It is written, The first man, Adam, became a living being,
the last Adam a life-giving spirit.
But the spiritual was not first;
rather the natural and then the spiritual.
The first man was from the earth, earthly;
the second man, from heaven.
As was the earthly one, so also are the earthly,
and as is the heavenly one, so also are the heavenly.
Just as we have borne the image of the earthly one,
we shall also bear the image of the heavenly one.
Gospel Lk 6:27-38
Jesus said to his disciples:
“To you who hear I say,
love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,
bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.
To the person who strikes you on one cheek,
offer the other one as well,
and from the person who takes your cloak,
do not withhold even your tunic.
Give to everyone who asks of you,
and from the one who takes what is yours do not demand it back.
Do to others, as you would have them do to you.
For if you love those who love you,
what credit is that to you?
Even sinners love those who love them.
And if you do good to those who do good to you,
what credit is that to you?
Even sinners do the same.
If you lend money to those from whom you expect repayment,
what credit is that to you?
Even sinners lend to sinners,
and get back the same amount.
But rather, love your enemies and do good to them,
and lend expecting nothing back;
then your reward will be great
and you will be children of the Most High,
for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.
Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.“Stop judging and you will not be judged.
Stop condemning and you will not be condemned.
Forgive and you will be forgiven.
Give, and gifts will be given to you;
a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing,
will be poured into your lap.
For the measure with which you measure
will in return be measured out to you.”
Some time ago, I visited a couple that just had a baby, a 15-days-old baby. I met them arguing and then they wanted me to be the judge. The argument was on “who does this baby resemble?” The wife told me to look at the nose and ears, the man told me to look at the entire face. As funny as that seems, I could feel the joy and pride a parent feels seeing himself or herself in a child.
I suppose this is how God feels too when as His children we resemble Him, especially in our conducts. God wants us to look like Him and behave like Him. That’s the point in today’s Gospel. Jesus is inviting us to imitate God’s character- His unconditional love, his gracious forgiveness, his amazing kindness, genuine patience, profound generosity and immense compassion. These are the qualities that project the image and likeness of the Father in us.
In the second reading, St Paul invites us to give up our semblance of Adam the earthly man and be modelled on Jesus, the heavenly man. That is, we must resemble Jesus who in turn is the visible reflection of the Father. Unfortunately, we often exhibit qualities that are never to be found in God, tendencies that obscure and distort the Father’s identity and pose a doubt on our identity as God’s children.
In this homily, I shall mention five of such tendencies and preach on one.
- Hatred of another person.
- Passion for revenge- paying evil with evil.
- The act of wickedness- lacking in compassion.
- Conspiracy of evil and malice.
- Being judgmental
Let’s preach on
Being Judgemental
The inclination to judge others hastily and to condemn people too promptly is something we all have to address in our lives. This is not consistent with God’s character. We read in John 3:17 that God didn’t send His Son to condemn the world. Unfortunately many times we condemn those God has not condemned.
When Jesus says in today’s gospel “do not judge.. do not condemn…,” he does not mean that we cannot identify or correct what is wrong. People have often misconstrued this, when you tell someone they are wrong on a particular matter, they may tell you “you are judging me.”
This is what it means to judge or condemn
- To write people off completely as being useless and irredeemable on account of their present weakness, behaviour, failure or faults.
That is, to fail to see the possibility of good in others or the good possibility in them. In the worst person here there is something good and in the best person, there is something imperfect.
When Abishai saw Saul in the first reading, all he could see was an enemy to be urgently eliminated. But David still saw in Saul, an anointed of the Lord whose life is precious to God and who can still become something better than an enemy.
Seeing the good possibility in others and the possibility of good in them is godly.
- To judge is to impose negative motivation on people’s action.
Only God searches the heart and probes the loins but sometimes we preside on people’s intention and interpret their action with untrue negativity. We are quick to assert that people’s piety, charity and good acts are prompted by wrong motivation. This is a sin against charity.
Saul was after the life of David because he felt David was intending to usurp his throne and that the popularity of David was calculated to weaken his relevance.
We often think wrongly of others this way. This is being judgmental.
- To judge is to criticize someone unfairly or uncharitably.
Every criticism of a person or his act, which is not prompted by love, the desire for truth, and the good of the person is an unfair judgment.
Sometimes we criticize people out of envy, malice and hatred, we criticize to discourage people or we feel threatened by their success, we are insecure so we turn our insecurity into bitter criticism. In most cases, the way we evaluate others reveals our true character and our own weaknesses rather than theirs.
We pray today that the Lord will help us to deal with every tendency, character, quality or inclination in us that distort the image and likeness of God in us.
A sermon preached by Rev. Fr. Emmanuel Okami on Sunday, February 24, 2019